My take on Appelbaum

I had a wonderful time this past Saturday riding with my director and fellow co-workers to one of the Appelbaum Training Institute seminars held in Nashville. It was a packed house, and filled with a bunch of lively  early childhood educators.

It was my first time to attend one of these seminars, which were started by Maryln Appelbaum along with her son, Marty. I learned a lot, and came home with a packet of papers with short tips and tricks we never had time to fully cover. The presenter, Ryan, was professional and funny rolled into one. My only fear with attending one of these events in the future is now I know you may be picked from the crowd for impromptu dancing and singing. Now although I laughed so hard I cried watching the "only male staff in the room" dance-off, I had no desire to be on center stage myself. That's just not my thing; reminds me of being stuck on an Algebra problem at the board, in front of the whole class. So I'll go back of course, if given the chance, but I won't raise my hand if the presenter asks if we know the Chicken Dance. :)

Our group's own Ms. Judith, was brave enough to go on stage to strut her stuff. Go Judith, go Judith.

One really cool thing about Appelbaum Training Institute is that they offer online classes for clock hours. I have worked in daycare but it was years ago. So as a newbie, I have to have 18 training hours in before August. We have local functions I can count, but generally they only net us a few hours a month. The seminar itself gave me six more. But I have the option of going to the ATI website at http://www.atiseminars.org/ and reading books and testing over those books online. Different books earn you various clock hours, and the state of TN accepts these. Many other states do as well, so check it out.